(1) Field of Invention
This invention relates to an effective dietary intervention plan. In one aspect all food is withheld for a period of at least 5 days, except for tropical root crops. In another aspect the invention relates to the treatment of various symptoms, conditions or diseases such as diarrhea, constipation, congestion, eczema, asthma, fatigue, muscle weakness, tension, and spasms, irritable bowel syndrome, swelling, anxiety, multiple chemical sensitivities, moderate to extensive and moderate to severe symptoms due to food allergies, sensitivities, and intolerances, bloating, pain, headaches, leaky gut, hyperactivity, sleeping difficulties, severe underweight, eating disorders, obsessive, compulsive disorders, panic attacks, sensory sensitivities, Alzheimer""s disease, acid reflux, irritability, delayed motor skills, delayed social skills, autism, PDD, infantile spasms, seizures by withholding from the patient for a period of at least 5 days all food except for concentrated forms of concentrated tropical root crops. Preferably the patient is also removed from external environmental sources of allergens. After the initial withholding period new foods may be introduced according to a particular selection and schedule.
In another aspect of the invention the subject undergoes an effective dietary intervention plan in which at least five (5) tropical root crops are selected, each eaten on a successive day, along with selected other meat, vegetables, and oils that the subject has never eaten before, eating a different selection of meat, vegetables, and oils each from different food families each day, with no food or food family being repeated for at least 5 days. In another aspect the invention relates to the treatment of various symptoms, conditions or diseases such as Diarrhea, constipation, congestion, eczema, asthma, fatigue, muscle weakness, tension, and spasms, irritable bowel syndrome, swelling, anxiety, multiple chemical sensitivities, moderate to extensive and moderate to severe symptoms due to food allergies, sensitivities, and intolerances, bloating, pain, headaches, leaky gut, hyperactivity, sleeping difficulties, severe underweight, eating disorders, obsessive, compulsive disorders, panic attacks, sensory sensitivities, Alzheimer""s disease, acid reflux, irritability, delayed motor skills, delayed social skills, autism, PDD, infantile spasms, seizures by withholding from the patient for a period of at least 5 days all food except for concentrated forms of concentrated tropical root crops. Preferably the patient is also removed from external environmental sources of allergens. After the initial withholding period new foods may be introduced according to a particular selection and schedule.
In another aspect of the invention the subject undergoes an effective dietary intervention plan in which at least seven (7) tropical root crops are selected, each eaten on a successive day, along with selected other meat, vegetables, and oils that the subject has never eaten before, eating a different selection of meat, vegetables, and oils each from different food families each day, with no food or food family being repeated for at least 7 days. In another aspect the invention relates to the treatment of various symptoms, conditions or diseases such as Diarrhea, constipation, congestion, eczema, asthma, fatigue, muscle weakness, tension, and spasms, irritable bowel syndrome, swelling, anxiety, multiple chemical sensitivities, moderate to extensive and moderate to severe symptoms due to food allergies, sensitivities, and intolerances, bloating, pain, headaches, leaky gut, hyperactivity, sleeping difficulties, severe underweight, eating disorders, obsessive, compulsive disorders, panic attacks, sensory sensitivities, Alzheimer""s disease, acid reflux, irritability, delayed motor skills, delayed social skills, autism, PDD, infantile spasms, seizures by withholding from the patient for a period of at least 5 days all food except for concentrated forms of concentrated tropical root crops. Preferably the patient is also removed from external environmental sources of allergens. After the initial withholding period new foods may be introduced according to a particular selection and schedule.
(2) Description of the Background
The emphasis of the above referenced patents was to provide as many new food choices for food allergic and food sensitive persons as possible, so they could at least find something to eat, could eat the foods they needed in concentrated form so that they would be able to eat enough calories, and would have sufficient variety to fit into their cultural preferences, and finally sufficient variety not to be boring.
Although this was an appropriate goal, it was found that simply providing a selection of new foods to choose from was not the highly effective solution hoped for. For the food allergic/sensitive individual several very important problems emerged:
1) Identification of problem foods. Although the presence of food reactions, a family history of food allergies; and the presence of chronic, persistent symptoms are characteristic of an individual who is likely to have food sensitivities, problems still exist limiting our success in identifying the specific allergens responsible (Williams, 2000).
One of the reasons that problem foods are difficult to identify is due to the fact that not all of the biochemical mechanisms are well understood and identified. Although about 30% of the population of countries around the world report food allergy problems (Matthews et al, 1998), only 1-2% of the complaints are identified as due a true food allergy, an abnormal or exaggerated immune-system response to specific proteins found in foods. The remainder are generally characterized as sensitivities, which are caused by other immune system mechanisms that are not well understood, intolerances, which are attributed to the lack of an appropriate enzyme, anxiety related to fear of past reactions that were not accurately characterized, and by somatic reactions triggered by past abusive situations. The ability to accurately apportion an individual""s food reactions among the latter four, and further to correctly associate a specific food with it""s fully characterized reaction pattern has until now essentially not been possible.
Although there are numerous tests available, including but not limited to, IgG specific RAST (radioallergosorbent test), IgG4 Specific RAST, IgE specific RAST, skin tests (scratch test or prick test), ELISA/EIA (Enzyme Immunoassays) panels to test for the presence of IgG and sometimes IgE antibodies, Scratch test, EPT (End-point-Titration), Cytotoxic Test, and ALCAT, no test is able to accurately and completely identify the foods that are the problem, even for those tests whose scope is narrow, e.g., RAST.
This investigator maintains that identification of problem foods is far more complex than anticipated by other investigators. All of the above tests focus on only one component of foods, namely the protein fraction. As should be readily available to any who care to think more broadly, there are far more substances than protein in food. In any given cell there are literally hundreds of thousands of substances present. They range from small simple molecules to complex, convoluted structural chemicals. The cells being the chemical soup that they are, literally any one or any combination of these substances could cause adverse physical symptoms in any given individual. Even in the conventional protein model, it is well known that the active regions of a protein are limited to a relatively few sites on that protein that have specific stereochemical configurations that accept and react with appropriately configured portions of other proteins or any number of smaller substances that match the stereochemical requirements.
In light of this, this investigator fails to understand why the study of the allergenic substances and the immune system of humans is limited to only proteins. There are myriad numbers of non-protein chemicals in an organism that an individual may react to, and reaction patterns to these substances have yet to be investigated, this investigator maintains that there is a large part of the immune system or some other parallel system that has yet to be identified, studied and characterized fully.
Soxe2x80x94in addition to the fact that even the protein allergies are not well identified, and there are sensitivities, intolerances, anxiety and somatic responses to myriad numbers of non-proteinaceous substances, now consider the changing characteristics of food. This complex milieu of hundreds of thousands of substances changes in composition depending upon numbers of factors: ripening, harvesting, drying, during processing, during post harvest storage, before and after peeling, before and after cooking, during chewing, during digestion, during absorption, during metabolism, and during assimilation.
Reactions commonly involve one or more but not all systems of the body. Thus a food may show no reaction in a skin test but cause a severe reaction in the digestive tract. A reaction may depend on the amount of food consumed, the presence of other foods that can slow digestion, and medications such as antihistamines that may hide reactions. A reaction apparently due to a food or food additive may in reality be due to another food that was accidentally added to the mixture during preparation. Toxins and food poisoning can cause symptoms that can be confused with food allergy. Some medical conditions such as hiatal hernia, ulcers and diverticulosis are associated with acute symptoms after eating.
Because of these daunting complexities, not only is no existing test adequate for the accurate identification of food allergies and sensitivities and intolerances, this investigator does not expect there to be derived a blood, in vitro, or in vivo test that would accurately identify all problem foods and apply accurately to all of the above situations.
At best, lab tests accurately identify the allergy-defined reactions that are the most obvious and serious. More subtle reactions are rarely accurately identified by these tests. Patient history is then relied upon, but unfortunately the patient is also able to tell only the most obvious reactions. The remainder tends to be confusing to both the patient and practitioner.
Although having a selection of new, unfamiliar foods to try is helpful, the lack of reliable information on foods to avoid tended to make a mockery of attempts at dietary intervention. Including new foods in a diet that also contains problem foods cannot provide the symptom relief desired by the food-allergic or food sensitive individual, and the result tended to be frustrating and not achieve the desired relief from symptoms.
The consensus in the medical community regarding testing for foods is generally that although not completely accurate, the tests at least give some indication of what some problem foods are, and they are better than nothing. From the viewpoint of a person suffering from food-related symptoms, this is an unsatisfying and unacceptable approach.
2) Distinguishing between symptoms associated with foods and those associated with other sources such as pollen, mold, pets, chemical sensitivities: Symptoms caused by foods can also be caused by other environmental factors such as pollen, mold, pets, and chemical sensitivities. Even if a diet were to be completely correct, and eliminate all food-related problems, a food sensitive individual might not even be able to tell much, since a food sensitive individual frequently also experiences similar symptoms caused by environmental exposures such as to pollen, mold, pets, and chemical exposures.
3) Persons following dietary advice tended to develop new food-related problems: A person with food allergies, sensitivities or intolerances who tries to develop a diet, is generally only able to correctly eliminate a few of the strongest food sensitivities. Because when one eliminates a food, it has to be substituted with something else, the food allergic person generally increases consumption of the most similar food available and this food is the very food that the individual is next most likely to become sensitive to. For example a person who is very sensitive to wheat is very likely to adjust the diet and eat large amounts of rye or oats, which are quite closely related to wheat.
At the same time, the person tends to inadvertently eat fewer calories. There are fewer uses for the substituted foods, and the number of ways the alternative foods are eaten is fewer. The allergic person generally fails to adjust by eating larger portions of the remaining complex carbohydrates.
Developing new food sensitivities and experiencing increasingly severe symptoms to other foods is a very common problem. When many problem foods remain undetected, and foods closely related to foods already eliminated are eaten more frequently, and overall level of nourishment falls, the effect can only be an eventual decline in general health and development of new food sensitivities and an increase in severity of symptoms.
In addition, because many individuals with food sensitivities also experienced symptoms from non-food items to which they might be continually exposed, such as molds or a recurring chemical exposure, the relief provided by elimination of some of the foods was insufficient, in terms of the overall level of exposures, to prevent the continuing long term deterioration in overall health that many individuals experience.
4) Use of supplements: Often individuals are advised to eliminate some foods from their diets, based on the results of the above inadequate tests, and then to take a number of dietary supplements to counteract the remaining symptoms the person is experiencing. Although some persons have improved using this strategy, complete relief from symptoms is very rare. Usually individuals remain at about the same symptom level as without treatment, or are slightly improved. The reason for this is that not all problem foods are removed form the diet, and the supplements provided generally are derived from some of the problem foods. This is particularly easy to occur since all of the sensitivities are unknown to begin with, so the provider is unable to specify the ingredients the individual would need to avoid.
5) One method, accepted-throughout the medical and scientific community as an accurate way to know what foods are well tolerated, is elimination and challenge (AAFA 2000). Except in instances in which the symptoms are very severe this method can be very confusing and inaccurate. For example, an individual with multiple food allergies, for instance 20 moderate to mild reactions, who is advised to eliminate one of the foods on a trial basis, is still consuming the remaining 19 in the diet. Since not all foods are eaten on the same day, and a food reaction may be immediate or delayed, and may last four days or longer before tapering off resulting in a continual fluctuation in symptoms, how is one to accurately determine whether an improvement occurred at all, that the improvement observed, if any, was actually due to the removal of the one food. Often the individual involved has a difficult time deciding if there was actually a change or not.
Because of the inherent variability that occurs using this method, it can take 3 or more years for an individual with multiple food sensitivities to identify many of the problem foods. This is a very discouraging prospect, because in the process they have often managed to become allergic or sensitive to a whole set of new foods. The result is a virtually non-ending set of experimentation that never fully provides the set of information needed by the individual.
(6) Rotary diversified diet and other approaches have also not proven to fully solve food related problems. For the reasons provided above, the majority of individuals following such approaches rotate every 2-4 days foods still causing them problems that were unidentified by inaccurate testing methods and foods that are the most likely to cause them problems next. Further, these diets are different enough that the former eating patterns are inappropriate and the individual inadvertently seriously under eats, generally eating only about 20-25% of the daily calories needed. Since it generally takes about 4 days for a food to be eliminated from the body and all absorbed and extracted components sufficiently metabolized and assimilated to the point that they are no longer recognized by the body, a 2-4 day rotation diet is essentially no rotation diet at all. A person on a 2-4 day rotation diet has essentially all of the food residues in his body all of the time. In addition to the effects of the dietary supplements mentioned earlier, the result is generally very frustrating to the individual, who generally feels some small amount of temporary improvement followed by a return of the previous symptoms at the previous level of greater in intensity. The individual then generally follows a frustrating, frightening series of cycles of diet modification followed by temporary improvement and subsequent development of new allergies and sensitivities.
The result is that in spite of the availability of new food choices, virtually every person suffering from mild to moderately severe food allergies, sensitivities and intolerances remains with the problem foods unidentified, continues to regularly consume foods that bother them, and suffer the adverse effects on health that come with continual, long-term adverse effects of chronic reactions, chronic irritation and tissue injury, and chronic inflammation.
It is widely reported that in the last few decades the reports of food allergies, sensitivities and intolerances have doubled, from 15 to 30%. This investigator notes that there has been a similar and simultaneous increase in the incidence and occurrence of a wide variety of chronic diseases and chronic health complaints. These begin in infancy with increases in the occurrence of colic, digestive upsets, congestion, eczema, various rashes, and asthma, and continue to autism, migraine headaches, fatigue, irritable bowel syndrome, and other digestive conditions, anxiety, Alzheimer""s disease, diabetes, arthritis, multiple sclerosis, seizures, and so forth.
The work of this investigator suggests that the increases in the occurrence of chronic disease are not merely coincidental, but are closely related. This investigator has discovered that many individual suffering for longer periods of time with altered body function caused by chronic untreated food allergies, sensitivities and intolerances, often develop serious chronic diseases that otherwise could be avoided. Further, if the damage caused by the disease is not yet permanent, this investigator has found that these chronic diseases can be fully reversed when food and other factors are completely eliminated, and exposure no longer occurs.
Still further consider the problems faced by individuals suffering from multiple chemical sensitivities. The ability to accurately diagnose the problem and accurately identify the substances the individual is sensitive to is poor, even worse than that for foods. Physicians and other health professionals tend to rely strongly on the patient""s descriptions of symptoms, circumstances and complaints, in making cause and effect assessments. This approach works well in only those rare instances in which an individual experiences no other allergies and sensitivities and so forth.
Generally a person experiencing multiple food sensitivities also experiences multiple chemical sensitivities, and also some anxiety, incorrect beliefs, and occasionally some symptoms associated with somatic disorders. These symptoms merge and blend to form an undulating pattern of symptoms and as a result the patient experiences some better days or parts of days and some worse days or parts of days. Even when accurately described by an extraordinarily observant individual, the symptoms experienced are so complicated that accurate cause and effect associations are virtually impossible.
Health professionals tend to contain the entire symptom picture within their discipline, meaning that at best only a small part of the total problem is addressed. Thus a person experiencing the above array of problems, if treated by an environmental physician, will generally find that professional attributing most of the problems to multiple chemical sensitivities. A wide variety of often very restrictive and expensive changes in home, lifestyle, and sometimes occupation are made, without the benefit of accurate identification of the substances actually causing the problems, but recommendations appropriate for an individual with sensitivities to almost everything as if all of the symptoms are being caused by multiple chemical sensitivities. The patient following these guidelines, even whole heartedly and diligently, generally finds after spending many thousands of dollars, that they are some better but overall have not improved all that much.
If this same person were to have been treated by a person specializing in food allergies, there would be few if any foods identified. The patient eliminating the foods that are identified generally feels that they are some better but overall have not improved all that much. If tests show no food allergies following within the standard true allergy definition, then no useful guidance is provided.
If this same person were to have been treated by a person specializing more broadly in food allergies and sensitivities, they the person would be tested by a variety of food tests, all of which have dubious results, and would at best be given a four day rotation diet that avoids the foods identified by the tests and substituting closely related foods to those omitted, and prescribed large numbers of supplements and digestive enzymes derived from foods they should be avoiding. The patient following this approach carefully and completely, generally feels that they are some better but overall have not improved all that much. Unfortunately these individuals often lose massive amounts of weight and in a few months become sensitive to more foods and experience more severe symptoms.
If this same person were to have been treated by a person specializing in anxiety disorders, the patient will generally find that professional attributing most of the array of symptoms to an anxiety disorder, and will be treated with counseling and appropriate pharmaceuticals for this problem. The patient generally reports that they are some better but overall have not improved all that much.
If this same person were diagnosed as suffering from a somatic disorder, the patient frequently becomes hostile and indignant, feeling that the complaints and very real symptoms are being ignored and undervalued by the practitioner. These individuals leave feeling undermined, misunderstood and insulted. The rare few who accept the diagnosis and enter treatment, find that they are some better but overall have not improved all that much.
The individual then desperately often turns to a variety of alternative therapies; in each instance the professional again assures the individual that all of the symptoms being experienced are likely to be eliminated by his method. People undergo weeks of sauna treatment, have their mercury amalgam fillings removed, undergo colonics and other cleansing therapies, undergo all sorts of acupuncture, biofeedback, and the like, and so forth, and overall find that they are some better but overall have not improved all that much.
Moderately severe to mild or subtle food allergies, sensitivities and intolerances can no longer be ignored or grudgingly tolerated by the medical community as uninteresting and unimportant. The answer to their commonly asked question: Where is the universal effect? As this investigator will show, it is right under their nose, presenting as a major causal factor in many chronic and debilitating diseases.
For the food sensitive individual, this means that mild or moderate allergies, sensitivities and intolerances are no longer something to xe2x80x98put up withxe2x80x99 and partially ameliorated with medications to alleviate some of the symptoms, food-related problems are significant and if unrecognized and not avoided, can cause serious chronic and debilitating diseases.
To sum, this investigator finds this field isxe2x80x94A MESS. Until now there has been no effective strategy available to either the conventional medical community or to the alternative medical community for accurately separating out the various causes and accurately identifying the specific agents or substances responsible for causing symptoms in each area. The incredible complexity coupled with inappropriate belief strategies and paradigms in both the conventional medical community and the alternative medical community have prevented the development of effective strategies.
It became very clear to this investigator that the complexities associated with food allergies and sensitivities, intolerances, and food associated anxieties and somatic disorders were not going to lead to effective strategies for treatment for a very long time, if ever, should the current directions and research emphasis continue. This investigator abandoned a search for a better in vitro or in vivo testing method, realizing that the huge number of substances and the many changes that occur to these substances over time, presented an asymptotically difficult challenge, and indicated that a completely different approach would be needed to effectively address the above described problems. And so, began to develop a completely new approach.